LIGHTHOUSE // a harry styles au

four

You slowly released the final breath of your morning meditation exercise just as the sun was peeking up over the city. You were lucky to have a very quiet building, knowing that wasn't always the case with apartment complexes. But you were thankful for your neighbors and how thick the walls of your place were. It was easy to lock yourself away in your apartment and forget about the world around you, especially first thing on a Friday morning.

You had a relatively light day - a meeting with Renee, a few calls with inspectors regarding permits and such, loads and loads of paperwork, but that was typical every day, and just one showing at 3pm.

It had been a few weeks of house searching with your mysterious author of a client, and still no luck. Although he had liked a few places out of the dozen you had shown him, nothing got him to actually put in an offer. There was one house that you were convinced would be the one, and he almost seemed like he was going to go for it, but something held him back and before you knew it, it was already sold. The market was getting tougher, which meant more competition, higher bids, and faster sales. If Harry decided he wanted a house, you would need to move quickly.

The only good thing was that he assured you, over and over again, that he would know when he saw it. You still weren't sure what that meant, how exactly he would know, what exactly that entailed. But he seemed so sure, so you chose to believe him. You couldn't lie though, you were a tiny bit apprehensive. You had shown him a lot of houses and felt no closer to finding "the one" then when you first agreed to help him. You so badly wanted to help him though.

You forced your tormenting thoughts away as you showered, and ignored them while you made coffee and breakfast, and pretended they didn't exist as you went about your day. Everytime they crept into your mind as the clock crept closer to 3pm, you swatted them away like an insistent fly. And then all of a sudden it was 1:45pm and your calendar was chiming with a reminder to get on the road.

It was a house a bit farther out, but you were really hoping it was going to be worth the drive. It sat on a huge piece of acreage that backed up to miles and miles of woods. One of the things you learned was that Harry liked the idea of not having neighbors, you had shown him enough variety to know that at least.

So you headed to your car with optimistically high hopes. Until you went to press the start button and all you got in return was a sputtering sound that came directly from the hood. You tried again, and again, but too no avail.

"Shit," you huffed, trying the start button once more even though you already knew it would make no difference. "Shit."

Fuck. Okay, it's fine, you thought. You would just call an Uber and whatever the cost was just a part of doing business. You knew if you didn't get to this showing it would probably be gone before you could reschedule. You were definitely going to be late now that you had to wait for a ride though, so you clicked into your contacts and tapped on Harry's name before putting it on speaker.

"Hello?" His deep voice came through the speaker, low and husky.

"Hey, Harry."

"Hello?"

"Hello?" you asked, confused.

"Yeah, you sound really far away. Can you hear me?"

You tapped the speaker button off and brought the phone up to your ear. "How about now?"

"Yeah, much better," he confirmed.

"Um, yeah, my car won't start. I just wanted to give you a heads up that I'll be late to the showing, but I'll still be there."

"How are you getting there?" he asked, his voice dry and monotoned.

"I have an Uber coming."